Mated to the Jardan Pirate

by Aria Bell

  His smile was smug and he reveled in letting the next bit out. “The Duke of Trasker of Von owns Telkquen Corp, a contractor supplying the Galactic Coalition. They transport secret military technology and valuable manufacturing resources, which would be worth huge amounts on the black market.”

  “Military technology. I don’t need the entire galactic fleet on our tail all the way back to the outer rim. No fancy weapon or expensive supplies are worth that. You’ve lost sight of the way we do things.”

  “Have I? Or have you simply lost your stomach for fighting?”

  I watched him through half-lidded eyes. “Do you remember that time when I cut off Tleg’s hand?” I said idly, putting my hand on my sword hilt. “That was fun. I haven’t been able to hack off anything with my blade in at least an hour. It almost sounds as if you’re volunteering.”

  “Cutting off his hand was ill-done. You should’ve just killed him. Now he is shamed.” Gren’don sneered at me. “All because you wanted to protect this human female.”

  “I give my orders. I expect them to be obeyed. If you’re so certain I should kill people who challenge me, then so be it. The next one to test me will die.”

  Nobody moved, and it was absolutely quiet on the bridge, except for the sounds of the computers and machines. We locked eyes. I waited to see if he would reach for his sword. I almost wished he would.

  Finally, he bowed, dropping his gaze. Coward.

  “You’re right, Captain,” he said stiffly. “We need to collect a ransom and get her off this ship as soon as we can. They say human females are far more trouble than they’re worth, and clearly it’s true.”

  I let that one slide, even though my fist itched to punch him. His quip might even be the truth, but I was the only one who was allowed to insult her. Still, I’d just headed off a potential mutiny by my first mate, and the mounting tension on the bridge dissipated as if someone had opened a valve. If I reacted too strongly to his mouthing off about a human, it might look…soft. And I couldn’t risk that.

  Not that I trusted Gren’don for an instant. I could practically smell the greed coming off him. He wanted that military tech. I wanted nothing to do with it because it would put an even bigger target on our backs.

  “Connect me to her father, this Duke Whoever-he-is,” I ordered. “The sooner we finish this, the sooner we warp out of here.”

  The communications tech scrambled to obey, sending subspace messages to the planet Tirinva while I waited impatiently in my captain’s chair, congratulating myself for not pacing the deck. I watched the shadows move as the massive asteroid we were tethered to slowly rotated away from the direct light of the distant sun.

  Finally, an elaborate family crest of some sort came up on the main viewscreen. The crest was filled with mythical creatures, fancy flourishes, and bore the name Trasker in a font I could barely read.

  “On your best behavior,” I said to the crew. “We don’t want to scare these fancy, high-born types any more than necessary. Not until we have their money, at least.”

  That earned a few laughs and cheers, easing the tension even further away from the breaking point it had been at moments ago. Just then, a distinguished-looking human male appeared on the screen. He had a short beard, gray hair, and the same intense eyes as the little captain I had locked away. And the same look in those eyes that said he wished looks could kill. Clearly, she was her father’s daughter.

  “I am Duke Archa Trasker. What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. “I was told you have something of mine?”

  I lazily leaned to one side in my captain’s chair and rested my chin on my fist as I eyed the man, trying to take his measure. “I have something very valuable of yours that I know you will want back as soon as possible.”

  The duke’s eyes narrowed dangerously. “You’re a pirate.”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  “What is your name, pirate? I want to know who they’ll end up executing.”

  Hmm. Like father, like daughter. Although his edges seemed even sharper. I bowed from my seat with a flourish. “Captain Kash Dra’sten of the Defiance Blade.”

  “I’ve never heard of you. You’re nothing but lowlife brigand scum undermining the order of law.”

  My crew liked that, cheering and mocking the duke and each other.

  I motioned them silent and placed a hand on my chest. “That wounds, sir. That wounds. But be that as it may, I want to talk terms. One gentleman to another.”

  “You stole the cargo of one of my ships then?” Duke Trasker said, his lip still curled. “And now I suppose you want to ransom it back. Keep it. It’s insured. Spend the money quickly before the galactic police catch you.”

  “Not one of your ships,” I corrected, folding my arms across my chest. “Your daughter. Captain Sylvis Trasker.”

  “I don’t have a daughter.”

  The words were sharp as a sword cut. The stillness on the bridge of the Defiance Blade was deep enough that the hum of computers and control panels seemed absurdly loud.

  “I’m not in the mood for games,” I warned, wondering what game he was playing at. “You don’t want every news and info broadcast in the quadrant talking about how Duke Trasker left his only daughter in the clutches of ruthless and depraved pirates, do you? That scandal might be hard to recover from, even for you.”

  He glared daggers at me, but I could see I’d hit him where he had no armor. What kind of father abandoned his daughter when she needed him? My hand edged toward my sword before I caught myself.

  “How do I know she’s not dead?” he demanded.

  “Your daughter is safe in her cabin. I’m sure she wants to go home to her family,” I said, now realizing the exact opposite had to be true. Clearly she’d fled this man and the life of an aristocrat and escaped to the stars. And here I was, dragging her home. For money. I gritted my teeth, feeling really and truly dirty for the first time in a very long time. Worse than a pig. I nearly ended the subspace transmission right then and there. If it had been entirely up to me, I would have told this dishonorable piece of gashtu kek to shove it up his ass and then dropped off Sylvis at the nearest spaceport.

  Unfortunately, I had a pirate crew chomping at the bit at the chance for a big ransom, spurred on by that bastard Gren’don. At the same time, we were all eager to get the human captain off our ship before every military cruiser in the quadrant came after us, plasma cannons blazing.

  The man’s jaw was clenched in rage, and when he spoke, his words were chilling. “There will be no happy family reunion, pirate. You’ve made a bad investment. I told you already. She is no longer my daughter. Keep her as your personal slave if you wish. It does not matter to me.”

  I was so stunned by this that my mouth dropped open and no sound came out. But my shock was quickly replaced with red rage. I wanted to reach through that viewscreen, grab the man by his fancy doublet, and pull him onto my bridge, just so I could have the pleasure of smashing his small head with my big fist. As many times as it took until he apologized. I could not conceive of a father saying something like that about a daughter. It enraged me and at the same time made me feel a sharp pang of sympathy for Sylvis.

  But this disgraceful man was out of my reach. I stood from my chair, clasped my hands behind my back, and gave him my hardest stare. “I’m sorry to hear that. Very sorry indeed. In fact, I’m so sorry that I’m going to specifically target all your cargo and trade ships from here on out, just to make up for my ‘bad investment.’ You’ll have to pay millions of credits for security.” I gave him a hard grin. “And that still won’t stop me from plundering your entire operation into bankruptcy.”

  “Your threats don’t scare me. You have no idea who you’re dealing with.”

  “Then you’ve never found yourself on the wrong side of the Jardan, you pathetic human.”

  He glowered at me. I held his gaze and waited. His move.

  “What do you want for her?” the duke finally bit out.

  “Not
hing more than you can afford. She’s quite a specimen, if I do say so myself. Beautiful. Charming. Easygoing.”

  “That sounds nothing like my daughter.”

  I turned to the comm technician and nodded. On the viewscreen, a picture of Captain Sylvis Trasker appeared. She was dressed in her captain’s uniform and was smiling charmingly. Some type of PR photo most likely. I’d never seen her smile that way. A smile like that was warm enough to melt butter. I wondered if I could get her to smile at me that way sometime.

  Obviously, I loved a challenge.

  The duke stared at the photo and grunted. “A picture doesn’t mean anything. I want to see her first. To make sure she’s still alive. Before this goes one step further, I want to speak with her. Otherwise no deal.”

  “Why?” I demanded, suddenly feeling protective of her. “You disowned her in front of my entire crew. What could you have to say to her now?”

  “That’s my business, pirate. And you will do this or we have no deal.” He named a time some twelve standard hours away and gave a subspace routing number to call him at. “If I don’t speak to her then, you’d better take your ship and flee to some deep-space rat hole, because you’ll never escape the people I send after you. They will blow your ship—what did you say it was called?”

  “The Defiance Blade.” I eyed him coldly.

  He gave a nasty laugh and shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. No one will remember it once it’s space dust.”

  This time I put my hand on my sword in a not-so-subtle gesture of warning. “After you speak to your daughter, we will deliver our demands.”

  The duke clenched his teeth, his lined face set in a silent snarl as he glared at me. “I’ll be waiting.”

  The image of the duke vanished, replaced by the expanse of stars and floating rock. It was very quiet on the bridge.

  “Take us to the Lyss System,” I ordered. That was where the Duke’s home planet of Tirinva was. Then I watched in silence from my captain’s chair as my crew scrambled to prepare the ship to leave the asteroid field.

  I should’ve felt triumphant after raiding a ship like the Mero Tallasa, but I didn’t. The crew was excited. It was easy to see the signs. They believed that with the recent haul and the ransom, they would be rich, and soon we’d haul tail back to the outer rim and live a life of excess and debauchery.

  If only it were that easy.

  But I couldn’t stop thinking about Captain Sylvis Trasker. As much as I wished I hadn’t had to take her hostage, I also found her an intriguing mystery. I actually felt bad for her. Her father was detestable. No wonder she’d fled home.

  My father had been a Jardan warrior. He’d died in battle when I was young, so I never had to deal with disappointing him by becoming a pirate. My mother, though, was another story. There were no fiercer mothers in the galaxy than a Jardan mother. My becoming a pirate instead of one of the warrior elite had broken her heart. I saw it in her eyes every time I talked to her. Over the comm, of course, because she would beat me with a baking pan if I showed up in person.

  I shook my head, watching on the main viewscreen as we left the asteroid field behind, my mind filled with thoughts of my family…and Sylvis Trasker’s family. Her father had been perfectly willing to leave her in the hands of space raiders because he’d disowned her. It made my friction with my mother pale by comparison, because I never doubted my mother still loved me. That was why I broke her heart. But I’d long ago had to accept who I was: a Jardan who scoured the galaxy, hunting for tempting booty. I couldn’t help a smirk. I had some right now, locked away in a room not a dozen meters from my bridge. Too bad she hated my guts. I thought back on my flippant offer to let her join my crew. And her preference for blowing herself out of the airlock. If I believed the woman would ever take orders from me, I might’ve enjoyed having her onboard. She certainly was no fawning damsel. I bet she could even learn to be half decent with a sword.

  But my smile quickly faded. I’d already put her in enough danger. Now the best thing I could hope for was to get her home safely. I didn’t want more incidents like the one with Tleg. The longer she was here, the more problems I would have.

  Whether she appreciated it or not, I had to protect her for as long as she was on my ship. And the longer she stayed, the more difficult that would become.

  * * *

  Captain Sylvis Trasker

  I spent a sleepless night in my cabin watching vids of Jardan males beating the crap out of each other on the room’s vidscreen. It looked like some kind of martial arts tournament that involved massive, bare-chested Jardan warriors battling each other, sometimes in hand-to-hand combat, sometimes with shock swords or other non-lethal—but still scary-looking—weapons, in gigantic arenas. I normally didn’t go for that type of thing, but nothing else was on, and I was locked in my room. Also, even though I would never admit it to anyone else, I found watching it rather…stimulating. The intensity. The competition. The bulging muscles… The way their pants stretched over their asses when they were kicking at each other… And I refused to feel the least bit guilty for mercilessly ogling them.

  Now that I thought about it, I was clearly suffering the effects of having my holo-room fantasy cut off before my climax. Another thing I could blame that arrogant bastard Dra’sten for. That had been extremely ungentlemanly of him, interrupting a lady like that.

  The bed in my room was comfortable enough despite being completely utilitarian. Too bad I was so worried that I only dozed off briefly before snapping back awake. After I finally fell into an exhausted sleep, it seemed like only seconds before I blinked awake again, squinting against the room’s artificial sunlight. But when I glanced at the time display, I realized I’d been asleep for half the day already and was famished.

  I threw an arm over my face, growling, tangling myself up in the blanket as I rolled out of bed. Still growling, I stumbled into the tube shower and its filtered, recycled water. Cold, not hot. I endured it as if it were some new form of torture, wishing the entire time that I was back on the Mero Tallasa where we had all the hot water I could ever want and the showers were three times as big.

  I crammed protein and carb bars into my face as I got dressed. I was just pulling on my uniform, cursing the fact I had exactly one outfit, when the door opened and Captain Dra’sten strode in like he owned everything in the place, including me.

  “Good,” he snapped, glancing me over head to toe. “You’re finally awake and dressed. I need you—”

  “And what if I wasn’t dressed?” I said, putting my hands on my hips and giving him my iciest glare. “Are you going to make a habit of barging in here willy-nilly at all hours?”

  He grunted and eyed me sourly. “I have no idea what ‘willy-nilly’ means, but yes, in fact I will be barging in here on a whim.” A twinkle came into his eye, and that roguish smile I hated crossed his lips again. “Now that we’ve established the rules, I need you to come with me. We have something important to get out of the way.”

  “And if I refuse?”

  His smile never slipped. “Oh, you won’t want to do that, tersa tuval. Making this more difficult won’t get you off my ship any faster.”

  “What was that you called me? Tersa something? Were you calling me a bitch in some secret language? Be a man and say it to my face. I’ve been called worse.”

  His laughter was rich and loud. It also made me simultaneously blush and grow angrier. He began to shake his head slowly, still grinning at me. “No. Tersa tuval means ‘fiery princess.’ How else can I describe you?”

  “How about Captain Trasker? That’s what I usually respond to.”

  “But what fun would that be?” With a bow, he swept a hand toward the doorway. “Now, if you will follow me, Your Royal Peevishness…”

  “I’m not a princess. You’re a fool if you think anyone will ransom me. Especially my father. I’m dead to him. No matter what other type of man he is, he prides himself on keeping his word.”

  “Oh, you might be
mistaken. I’ve already spoken to your father. And he’s demanded to speak to you before we can take you home.”

  I tried to think of something to say but could come up with nothing. His words sent ice through my veins. My father… It had been so many years since I’d seen him. The last time had been the night I’d told him my intentions to attend the Interstellar Space Academy, whether he approved or not. He had not. He’d cut me off from both him and my mother and told me to my face that he no longer had a daughter. The look in his eyes said he was certain I’d come crawling back to him with my tail between my legs. I hadn’t. It had nearly killed me, attending the academy and working every hour I wasn’t studying, but I’d done it. After I graduated near the top of my class, I’d received my first commission as second mate on the interstellar pleasure liner the Domo Starsille.

  And from there I’d eventually ended up here.